How to Stop Taking Life Too Seriously

On a beautiful summer morning, while still lying on the bed my daughter said to me, “Mommy, I think life is a dream and we awake when we die.”

I looked at her in amazement. How could an eight-year-old child come up with such a profound insight, I wonder.

To check, I asked her, “Where did you get the idea?”

I thought she might hear it from a Youtube channel. Nowadays, kids learn everything online; from how to draw to how to create a video game.

Unhurried, she answered, "Just now. I felt like I was asleep, but I was awake. And sometimes when I am outside, I feel like I am dreaming.”

Somehow, beyond my analytical and intellectual mind, I know the life that I am living is a dream too.

In this dream, we are free to play a game; pretending life is hard, imagining there is no way out. Sometimes we are so involved with our dream, we forget it is only a dream. And since it is only a dream, we can create whatever dream we want to experience.

“You’re right. Life Is a dream. While we are dreaming, let’s create a delightful dream.” I said to her.

I gave her a big hug and a kiss. Looking closely into her beautiful brown eyes, I continued “Thank you for choosing me as your mother in your dream.”

She smiled.

As a wave of gratitude filled my body, a few things that were heavy on my mind a day before simply vanished from my mental screen. I cherished my dream.

If you can not convince your brain that life is a dream, Elbert Hubbard, an American writer and philosopher at the turn of the 20th century, could offer you a different way of looking at it. He said, “Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive.” How true that is.